Beaches (3 page)

“Need any help, Karen?” Jerry asked.

“No, sir,” she responded, and gently wheeled her little staircase onto the stage.

“Hello, Harry,” Karen said, looking into the orchestra pit and waving warmly.

Harry melted. “Hi, Karen, precious,” he said. “I have your song right on top.”

“Thank you, Harry,” Karen said. “And thank you, Mister Grey, for giving me the opportunity to present my act before your guests.”

Bertie looked at Mrs. Lewandowski. She had sat down in the front row when Karen came onstage, and her eyes watched her daughter, knowingly.

“Clear the stage,” yelled Jerry Grey. He was talking to Bertie, Leona, and Cee Cee.

Led by Cee Cee, they walked down the steps and sat in the front row. They were lined up now. Mrs. Lewandowski, Bertie, Leona, Cee Cee, Jerry Grey, Melman, and Irene.

Harry played a few bars of music and Karen walked around to the back of the staircase and turned a switch and the stairs lighted up. Then Karen walked to the top of the staircase and sat down. She put her sweet little face into one of her hands and cocked her head to the side.

I’ll build a stairway to paradise, With a new step every day . . .

Bertie peeked out of the corner of her eye at Mrs. Lewandowski, who mouthed each word as her daughter sang.

When the song was finished, Karen jumped daintily to the stage floor and then, just as daintily, turned upside

down and stood on her hands. In this position, she began walking on her hands around the staircase. When she had circled once, she paused for a moment at the bottom of the steps and then, on her hands, walked up the steps. It was something to see.

Irene Melman applauded. The others sat quietly. When Karen reached the platform at the top of the staircase on her hands, Harry stopped playing. Slowly, Karen brought her feet over her head until she was standing and then she leaned forward onto her hands, lifting her feet over, and then turning over again and again on the platform, until her little body was making such rapid head-over-heels circles that Bertie was reminded of the story of Little Black Sambo. And as the yellow sequins flashed by, Bertie wondered if Karen would turn into a pool of butter. The music peaked and Karen stopped and stood for a moment at the top of the staircase, her face flushed, looking more beautiful than ever. She sang,

I’ll build a stairway to paradise, With a new step . . .

She twirled around.

I said a new step . . . She twirled again.

That’s right, a new step e-ve-ry day!

At that, Karen leaped into the air, her tiny legs spread, her toes pointed, and landed on the platform in a perfect split.

Mrs. Lewandowski applauded. Jerry Grey cheered; Melman and Irene rose to their feet, applauding. Cee Cee, Leona, and Bertie just sat there.

Karen smiled sweetly. “Thank you. Thank all of you,”

she said as she alighted from the staircase, turned off the switch, and pushed the staircase offstage. Mrs. Lewandowski ran up on the stage to help.

“Why don’t you girls change clothes and come back,” Jerry Grey said to the air.

Cee Cee got up and walked across the stage. Bertie and Leona followed.

In the dressing room, Cee Cee changed silently back into her plaid bathing suit. Leona ate the remainder of the sandwiches, and Bertie closed all of the make-up containers and put them neatly into the tool kit. Bertie wanted to tell Cee Cee how wonderful she had been, how she was the best one, and how Mrs. Lewandowski had had some nerve with that big mouth to come in there and push her way into Cee Cee’s audition. But she was afraid to say it, in case maybe it would make Cee Cee feel bad instead of cheering her up.

Leona hung the red costume on the rack, and the three of them headed back toward the stage.

Mrs. Lewandowski and Karen were already there. Karen had changed into a white pique pinafore. They sat in the front row talking to Jerry, Melman, and Irene. Harry was gone. When they saw Cee Cee, they were quiet.

Cee Cee, Leona, and Bertie sat in the front row, too.

When they were seated, Joe Melman got up on the stage and walked back and forth as if he was in a play. Then he stopped and looked out at all of them. “Well, now,” he said. “Well. This was certainly a lucky break for Joe Melman. Yes, it was. Indeed. Visiting here in Atlantic City with my wife, Irene, after a brief business trip to New York, and what do I find? Yep. What do I find? Well, now. After conducting a long and arduous search on the Coast for a child to star in a picture I’m casting, as luck would have it, I happen upon the Jerry Grey Kiddie Show. And . . . what a wonderful surprise I get when not one child in the show is a great little star . . . but two.

There are two of them. Well, needless to say, I said to myself, Joe, perhaps, now just perhaps, instead of there being just one little girl in the film, perhaps I could have them rewrite the film and have there be two. Two little girls.’ After all, I mean, after all. Here are two wonderful, and I mean that-” Bertie saw him look right at Cee Cee-“both equally wonderful, uh . . . little actresses. Right?” Melman smiled.

“But then I thought about it and I said to myself, “Joe. Joe Melman. You have been a casting director for quite a few years, despite your tender age.’ ” Mr. Melman laughed at his own joke. Jerry Grey laughed. Irene Melman smiled. Cee Cee, Bertie, and Leona didn’t react.

” ‘And you know better than that. In spite of the fact that that’s the way you would like to handle this, because they’re both little stars, and they are both great little stars, that’s just not the way it’s done.’ So I’m afraid that one of you is going to have to be disappointed.” Bertie started to sweat. “And, Cee Cee, I’m afraid it will have to be you.”

Without another word, as if on cue, everyone stood up. Karen stayed very close to her mother, holding on to her skirt. She didn’t look at Cee Cee at all. Jerry Grey walked over and patted Cee Cee on the head, then walked back to Irene, Mrs. Lewandowski, and Karen. Joe Melman joined them, and they walked up the aisle and out of the theater.

Cee Cee sat down quietly in the center seat in the front row and stared at the stage. Bertie and Leona looked at her silently. The moment the back door of the theater closed, Cee Cee put her head in her hands. Then her tiny red curls began to shake and then to heave and then she let out a giant gasp and then another. When she lifted her head, her made-up face was covered with long, black tracks of mascara, and tears poured from her eyes.

Leona started to go to her, but stopped when Cee Cee emitted a piercing cry. “My life. My whole life. Oh, God. It’s over,” she sobbed.

“Gee,” Leona cried out, “it ain’t ovah. Ye’r a kid.” Leona moved toward her.

“No!” Cee Cee screamed. “No!” and she jumped to her feet and she ran, into the orchestra pit, fists in the air. When she got to the piano, she slopped and began punching the piano wildly, banging out an eerie, violent tune on the keys. She grabbed her head in her hands for a moment and then pushed her way through the orchestra pit, knocking over folding chairs and music stands as she went, still screaming.

“My life. Oh, God. Oh, no.”

She jumped up on the stage, still screaming, took one last, long breath and then collapsed in a heap on the stage, where she sat sobbing quietly.

Bertie and Leona walked to the stage. “Gee?” Leona said.

Cee Cee looked up at her mother, her eyes burning, her entire face swollen. “How,” she asked. “How did she know, Leona? How did Lewandowski find out?” Then, screaming, “How, fa chrissake?”

Bertie looked at Leona. Leona had gone very pale.

“Look . . . um . . . kids. How ‘bout a bite? I’ll treat yiz both, you and the kid, to a big meal somewheres.”

“Leona,” shouted Cee Cee, standing up. “How did she know? How?”

Leona looked helplessly at Bertie as though Bertie would have some magic answer. When Bertie’s look was equally helpless, Leona turned back to Cee Cee and replied timidly, “Well, um … I did happen to run into her when I was gettin’ the sandwiches and-”

“Leona,” Cee Cee said quietly. “You told her. It was you. You saw Lewandowski and told her. You were braggin’ to her, weren’t you?”

“Well, I mentioned-”

“Leona,” Cee Cee screamed. “Leona!” And with that, the small girl thrust her entire body at her mother, the way football players thrust themselves at the practice bag,

and then pulled away and thrust herself at her mother again and again. With each thrust of her body, she cried out like an animal.

Leona stood there as though the child was making a gesture of love. Tirelessly, Cee Cee fell on Leona until at last she slid to the floor at her mother’s feet. Leona stooped down on her haunches next to the girl and caressed her baby’s hair, and the mother and daughter sobbed together for a long time.

Bertie turned quietly and walked into the wings to the brown wooden door marked
EXIT
and left. Standing on the boardwalk, all the directions seemed clear to her for the first time and, unafraid, she walked on the boardwalk toward the place where she knew her mother and Aunt Neetie would be, and down the steps to the beach.

Neetie was asleep, and Bertie’s mom was under an umbrella reading Reader’s Digest and smoking a cigarette. When Bertie stood next to the umbrella, her mom looked

UP-

“Oh, Bert. Hi, honey,” she said. “Beady to go up? It’s getting late, angel. I’ll bet you’re hungry.”

“Yeah,” Bertie said.

“Neetie,” Bertie’s mom said, poking Aunt Neetie. “Wake up. It’s almost five o’clock, and your back looks like a lobster.”

Bertie’s mom put out her cigarette and began gathering the towels, magazines and suntan lotion.

“Have a nice day, Puss?” she asked.

“Mmmm-hmmm.”

“Where’s your bucket and shovel?”

“Don’t know.”

“Lost? Well, we’ll get another one tomorrow.”

Aunt Neetie, Bertie’s mom, and Bertie each carried some of the beach stuff and headed for their hotel room. They had just enough time to take a shower and dress and stop for an early dinner before the dinner crowd got there.

Bertie decided that the new bucket and shovel set was better than the old one. To begin with, the shovel said “Atlantic City” on the handle, so when she took it back to Pittsburgh, she could show the other kids where she got it, and the new bucket was deeper than the old one, so when she filled it with wet sand and then turned it over, the bucket-shaped piles it made were very impressive.

“Hiya, kid,” said a voice.

Bertie looked up. It was Cee Cee Bloom. She was wearing white pedal pushers and a pink printed shirt. Her eyes were a little puffy, but her smile was big and warm.

“Been lookin’ all over for ya. Me and Leona are goin’ home today. I miss my dad … so I quit the show. Leona says after we get home, maybe I could go to summer camp for a few weeks. You know, like the real kids. So here’s my address in the Bronx,” she said, handing Bertie a little white piece of paper. “Maybe we’ll be pen pals or somethin’.”

“Thanks, Gee,” Bertie said, then hoped the familiarity was okay.

“Thank you, kid,” Cee Cee said as she turned to walk up the beach. Bertie watched her go.

When she reached the steps, before she walked up to the boardwalk, Cee Cee turned back to where she knew Bertie was watching, and she smiled and blew Bertie a kiss. Bertie recognized the gesture. It was the kind of kiss Cee Cee blew to the audience when the show was over and she was taking her bows. Bertie held the little white piece of paper tightly in her hand.

DEAR
CEE
CEE
,

I
KNOW
THAT
YOU
CANNOT
COME
TO MY PAR7T
BUT
1
THOUGHT
YOU
WOULD
LIKE
TO
SEE
MY
INVITATIONS
ANYWAY
.

RAGGEDY
ANN
AND
RAGGEDY
ANDY
ARE
JOINING
US
FOR
CAKE
AND
CANDY
.
HOPE
THAT
YOU
WILL
COME
TO
SAY
HAPPY
TIMES
ON MY
BIRTHDAY
.

BERTIE
WHITE

REMEMBER
ME
FROM

A.C.?

DEAR
BERTIE
,

IN
SCHOOL
WE
ARE
WRITING
LETTERS
TO
PEN
PALS
. SO
WILL
YOU
BE
MINE
, OKAY?
THE
BEST
NEWS
IS
THAT
MY
MOM’S
GOING
TO
GET
ME A
BRA
. IT
HAS
ELASTIC
SO IT
COULD
FIT
AND
I
WON’T
NEED
AN
UNDERSHIRT
ANYMORE
.
RSVP

LOVE
.

CECILIA
BLOOM
.

DEAR
CEE
CEE
.

MY
MOM
SAID
I
SHOULD
SEND
YOU
A
COPY
OF
THIS
DUMB
PICTURE
.
EVEN
THOUGH
1
HATE
IT.
YESTERDAY
WHEN
WE
GOT
THEM
SHARON
WHITMAN
WHO
SITS
NEXT
TO ME
AND
GOT
MINE
BY
MISTAKE
SAID
I AM SO
SKINNY
I
LOOK
LIKE
OLIVE
OYL
WHICH
IS
THE
SKINNY
GIRL
IN
POPEYE
AND
I
CRIED
.